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# cunning

«cunning» in Mova's early modern english dictionary: **skilful, clever, sly** — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 3 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

### kind

archaic sense

### modern equivalent

skilful, clever, sly

### part of speech

adjective

### meaning for a pupil

Clever with the hands or mind, or clever at tricking people. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/emode/C/cunning/#m1)

### how it differs from today

Today it means sly or tricky. In the first sentence it means skilful at hunting, which is the old sense.

### examples

- And the boys grew; and Esau was a cunning hunter, a man of the field; and Jacob was a quiet man, dwelling in tents. (Torah GEN.25.27, JPS 1917) [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/emode/C/cunning/#x1)
- “He is very old and very cunning. (The Jungle Book) [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/emode/C/cunning/#x2)
- Then he tried to get out by cunning. (The Arabian Nights Entertainments) [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/emode/C/cunning/#x3)

### primary record

cunning

### tests

manual 10.3; corpora 159 (Torah 1, tales 158, Sefer Yetzirah 0); EWT 0; ratio 18.0 (Torah alone 2.3); Wiktionary no archaic label

### In the corpora

- [The captain of fifty, and the man of rank, and the counsellor, and the cunning charmer, and the skilful enchanter.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/neviim/jps/ISA.57/)
- [Which hearkeneth not to the voice of charmers, or of the most cunning binder of spells.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/jps/PSA.951/)
- [If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/ketuvim/jps/PSA.2509/)

### Trees and pragmatics

[Every meaning and example of «cunning» parsed by Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/emode/C/cunning/), each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.